


Freely Given

by AdmirableMonster (Mertiya)



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Dubious Consent, Extremely Dubious Consent, Fealty Kink, Fuck Or Die, M/M, Secrets Revealed, Tyelpe tries very hard to be as safe sane and consensual as possible, but well it's fuck or die, demisexual tyelpe, shows up right at the end, so please bear that in mind, soft silvergifting, things end way better than annatar deserves, tyelpe is a paladin, whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-02
Updated: 2020-12-02
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:02:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27844168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mertiya/pseuds/AdmirableMonster
Summary: Annatar makes the very questionable choice of not wearing protective equipment in the lab again.  It has unfortunate consequences.Celebrimbor grapples with ethics and some very long-held secrets are revealed.
Relationships: Annatar/Celebrimbor | Telperinquar
Comments: 31
Kudos: 84





	Freely Given

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [What I Take From You](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18616768) by [Harp_of_Gold](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Harp_of_Gold/pseuds/Harp_of_Gold). 



> thanks to starlightwalking, 8lottie8, basalt_serpent, and moiety for Thoughts TM
> 
> also several other people whose conversation inspired this

It was not like Annatar to be late to the laboratory.It was far more common for Celebrimbor to find him already there when he rose in the morning, with a cheerful, slightly teasing look on his face, saying something about Elves requiring too much sleep.But this morning he was conspicuously absent, and Celebrimbor was concerned.

Now, he stood in front of the door of Annatar’s chambers, knocking and knocking.The Maia was certainly within them; there was a particular warmth about the chamber door, an elusive _aliveness_ that they lacked when he was gone, but he was not answering.Frowning, Celebrimbor tried the door and found it unlocked.When he stepped in, his concern only deepened.The room smelled _off_ ; there was a strange sweet scent hanging about it.There was also a conspicuous lump in the bed.

Annatar’s face was slick with sweat, and he made a horrible noise as Celebrimbor pulled the blankets back.“Annatar,” Celebrimbor breathed.“What…what is wrong?”

“I,” Annatar breathed.Then he cringed, throwing an arm across his face.“Leave, please,” he said, but his voice held none of its usual commanding ring.He sounded almost plaintive.

“ _Leave_?” Celebrimbor stammered.“When you are clearly ill?”He reached out to press a hand to Annatar’s forehead.“I did not know that a Maia could be so ill.You are feverish—burning up.”

“Don’t,” Annatar whispered, but he seemed dazed, his eyes blown wide and dark, the pupils nearly swallowing the golden irises.Fire danced in them.He pushed his head into Celebrimbor’s hand, butting at it like a cat demanded to be stroked.“Do not touch me,” he begged, but when Celebrimbor tried to pull away, he whimpered softly.“Don’t stop— _aaaahhh_ —” he said in the next moment.

“I am going to fetch a healer,” Celebrimbor told him, starting to rise from the bed.He was stopped when Annatar reached out and grabbed his wrist.The Maia’s hand felt like a cuff of molten iron.

“ _No_ ,” Annatar rasped.“No, no—please—Tyelpe—I have felt this before and I _cannot_ —I would rather _die_ —” He whimpered again, and Celebrimbor ached to hear the desperation in his voice.

“All right.”He settled himself on the side of the bed.“I won’t leave just yet.But really, Annatar, you need a healer.”

Annatar laughed at that, flopping back onto the bed, laughter that started out sounding amused and rapidly devolved into hysterical, to Celebrimbor’s deepening concern. He leaned over the Maia, turning his fingers over Annatar’s grip in an attempt to check his pulse, although he had no idea if Annatar’s physiology was sufficiently like an Elf’s for him to gather any information.The pulse beat wildly, arrhythmically, against his thumb.

“Talk to me,” he said.“If you don’t want me to get you a healer, I need to know what’s going on.You said you have felt this before?”

A weak affirmative noise between more bouts of wild laughter that sounded as if they were shading to sobs.“Aphrodisiac,” Annatar gritted out, finally, unwillingly.“Too high a dose.I don’t—I don’t know how I was exposed but—”

“But you have a bad habit of not wearing anything protective in the laboratory, because ‘Maiar don’t need protection.’”Celebrimbor sighed.Annatar’s fingers were now stroking the inside of his wrist restlessly, as if he couldn’t stop them.Then, as Annatar’s words really registered, “ _Aphrodisiac?_ And you’ve— _before_ —?”

“Tyelpe,” Annatar moaned, his voice raw and wrecked now.He was obviously starting to lose coherence.He let go of Celebrimbor’s wrist just to wriggle across the bed and fling himself into Celebrimbor’s lap.“Please, _please_.”His hands slipped beneath Celebrimbor’s work tunic and up onto his bare waist.

“Annatar!” Celebrimbor gasped.“Wait!What are you—”

His friend’s eyes were clouded, and Celebrimbor realized that he was hitching his hips and rutting against the bed.He nuzzled his face into Celebrimbor’s stomach and then started moving lower.

“Annatar, _no_ ,” Celebrimbor said firmly.“You know this isn’t what you want.”

When Annatar looked up, his lips were swollen, his eyes glassy, and there was a bone-deep terror in them that made Celebrimbor want to cry.“I know,” he whispered.“Oh, I do—I do know, but I can’t—it _hurts_ — _please_ —”He sobbed, then jerked one arm away to bite down on it.

“Shhh, shhh.”Celebrimbor stroked his hair.“You said this has happened before?What did you do then?”

Annatar’s face was pained.“Tied me up,” he mumbled.“I g-gave him my pain.”

There was—so much there, bundled up in those few little phrases.“Your pain?” Celebrimbor prompted.

There were tears standing out on Annatar’s silver lashes, and his silver-gold hair was shot through with a sheen of red like firelight.“Don’t ask, please, please, don’t _ask_ ,” he got out.A trickle of red blood made its way down from a bitten lip.“I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you _everything_ , and—please, please don’t make me—” He sobbed again.“Give you anything,” he whispered.“Worship you.Anything.”

“You don’t have to give me anything,” Celebrimbor told him gently.“Just tell me—will this go away with time?Or…”

“Don’t know,” gasped Annatar.“Last time he let me—he let me come—so many times, it hurt but I couldn’t—”

Which meant that it was definitely not safe to assume it would.Celebrimbor had an awful feeling that he wasn’t entirely objective anymore.He ought to get up and summon one of the healers, but Annatar had begged so desperately that he didn’t want to do that either.It had to be bad enough for the proud Maia for Celebrimbor to be seeing him like this.For him to be forced to show this to someone _else_ —

There wasn’t a good answer.He couldn’t _get_ coherent consent out of Annatar like this, but he equally couldn’t leave him.Annatar’s hands had started moving up and down across his waist again, and Celebrimbor thought dizzily that there was something very ironic about how much he had wanted Annatar to want him—but not like this.

“All right,” he whispered.“Come here.Let’s take care of you, all right?”

Annatar whimpered and promptly surged up off the bed to kiss him and grind against him, panting and moaning incoherently.Celebrimbor gasped at the heat of him and the armful of him, at the pliance of Annatar’s body beneath his hands and the hardness of his cock pressed right into Celebrimbor’s.

“But I—you’ll have to—” Celebrimbor managed through the fog of Annatar’s lips on his throat, those kisses turned biting and the more tempting for it, “I only—I only know the theory, Annatar, you have to—”His hands slipped to roam up and down over Annatar’s back, and Annatar shuddered to a halt again.

“ _What_?” he snarled.“Tyelpe—”

“There isn’t, there hasn’t, there’s never been anyone else,” Celebrimbor gabbled.“I didn’t know what they were _talking about_ until I saw you—and I know—I’m not—I’m just here—and it’s _fine_ , Annatar, I don’t want you to be in any more pain than you— _aaaah_ —”Those long fingers had slipped down and taken his cock in hand.

Annatar pressed them together, length to length, groaning as he did so.His golden hair was shading further and further towards molten as he moved, and the lines of his _fana_ were subtly changing.He pressed his face into the corner of Celebrimbor’s neck.“Not just here,” he panted as they thrust against one another.“I was going to—I was going to—”Gods, Celebrimbor could lose himself in the heat of him and scent of him, fire and fire-heated metal, and something else uniquely Annatar.

“What?” Celebrimbor asked.“Annatar, if you keep doing that—”

Annatar made a desperate noise and his hand tightened about both of them as he climaxed.“Not enough,” he whispered, “ _Melkor_ , it’s not _enough_ —I need—”

Celebrimbor, who had been perhaps two seconds away from climaxing himself, froze, staring into those red-gold eyes, surrounded by the flaming flicker of his crimson hair.“You are not a Maia of Aulë,” he said through numb lips.Well—he had _known_ that, he had know there was _something_ , but— _Melkor_?Oh no.Oh _no_.The only blood on Annatar’s face right now was his own, but it was so easy to imagine that it was not.

Fear was rising in Annatar’s eyes, sudden and shocking.“Tyelpe,” he croaked.He had not stopped thrusting; perhaps he could not.He was so helpless in front of Celebrimbor, spilling every one of his secrets—the way he had torn countless secrets from others, through pain and torment. 

It was like looking at a double image, two paintings overlaid one on top of the other.The ethereal Maia of Aulë whose etherealness slipped when he got excited, who worked breathlessly with Celebrimbor to create ever greater and more beautiful wonders—and the burning Maia of _Melkor_ (oh, no, no, _no_ ), who destroyed everything he touched, who had nearly killed Celebrimbor’s uncle, who _had_ killed his uncle’s husband.Here he was— _Sauron_ , the defiler, delivered into Celebrimbor’s hands by pure chance and his own arrogance.

All Celebrimbor had to do to take vengeance was get up and leave him here to scream himself hoarse alone.He didn’t have to take any action himself.All he had to do was not to help him.

Clearly Annatar had realized as much as well, because he was trembling.

“Why?” Celebrimbor asked him helplessly.“Why did you come _here_?”And then he realized how unfair that was (and yet it was justice, it could only be called justice), as Annatar pressed both hands to his mouth, tears leaking from his lovely eyes.He would not be able to keep himself silent forever, Celebrimbor could see that much.

And yet—how many years had they worked together now?What had Celebrimbor said about Eregion?It was a place to leave your past behind you.He had never asked, though he had known what darkness might lurk in Annatar’s.Galadriel thought him foolish; well, foolish he might be, but it was his city and that was the way he wanted to live.

“No, wait,” he said.“You don’t have to answer.”Shock wrote itself across Annatar’s face.“Come here,” Celebrimbor told him.“You are still in Eregion, and I am still its lord.I will not take from you what is not freely given, Annatar.”

Annatar wailed, half-falling into Celebrimbor’s lap.He seemed almost wordless now, pressing his hands against Celebrimbor’s face, shoulders, chest and kissing him, all along the line of his jaw.“Please,” he got out, slurred.“Please, Tyelpe, need you, _need you_ —”He was bathed in sweat all over, but the intense impression of fire had muted a little, or perhaps transmuted: from firelight to its reflection in silver.

“Yes,” Celebrimbor said, softly.“Yes, Annatar.”He laid him gently back on the bed and began to disrobe.“Like I said, I will need a little direction.”He felt dizzy.He felt distant.He didn’t know how he felt. 

Annatar was already throwing off his light robe, nearly ripping it apart in his haste.He flung himself back onto the bed, letting his legs fall open, then pressed two fingers inside himself, and Celebrimbor felt his own breath hitch in his lungs. _Is this a trick—a test?_ His grandfather’s old paranoia boiled in his veins, demanding his attention.

No.It was just—something that had happened.And what had happened over these years between them was separate from what had happened to each of them before.Celebrimbor seated himself between Annatar’s legs and rubbed his hands down those slender thighs.Annatar rocked his hips up desperately, making more little pained whimpers, and Celebrimbor took his cock in hand and stroked it, clumsily at first, then with more and more facility.

“Hurts—please—need you,” whimpered Annatar.Valar, but he was beautiful, every line of him.Celebrimbor felt just the tiniest touch of guilt at taking pleasure from this, when it was clearly agonizing for his partner, but he did not see that there was a better choice available, and there was still a little voice whispering about justice in his head.He shook them all off and bent forward, struggling to line himself up.He didn’t get very far before Annatar had hooked his legs behind Celebrimbor’s back and pulled him forward, almost forcing Celebrimbor into him.

A broken cry dropped from both their lips.Celebrimbor fell forward and seemed almost to keep falling as he started to thrust.Annatar cried out again, and he fisted both his hands in Celebrimbor’s hair, holding on tightly.He was almost _burning_ inside, slick and receptive somehow.Celebrimbor had never felt anything like this pleasure; it beggared description.He certainly hadn’t imagined anything like this during the handful of furtive late-night interactions with his own hand and his own imagination.“Annatar,” he gasped.“ _Ai_ —love—” and that had certainly slipped out without his consent.

Those red-gold eyes opened, blown wide and dark and desperate.“ _Tyelpe_ ,” Annatar moaned.He tightened his hands and pulled Celebrimbor down, kissing him hard and sloppily, so that Celebrimbor’s tongue was inside his mouth while Celebrimbor continued to move inside him.Each movement brought him closer to his peak.

“I don’t—I don’t know how much longer—”

“ _Please don’t stop_ ,” Annatar moaned.His hand dropped on top of Celebrimbor’s, jerking desperately at his still-hard erection, and he made a squealing noise.Celebrimbor felt tight muscles clench around him, and he trembled with the effort of keeping his own climax at bay.“Ah,” Annatar sobbed.“It hurts, it hurts, _please don’t stop_ , please _never_ stop, I’ll—”

“Shhh, shhh, shhh.”Celebrimbor folded himself forward, slotting himself chest to chest against Annatar, stroking his hair and his waist urgently as he kept thrusting into him.“I’ve got you, I’ve got you.You’re safe.”

Annatar laughed, high and desperate, still fucking himself on Celebrimbor’s cock.“ _Safe_?” he gasped.“No—no.”

“ _Yes_ ,” Celebrimbor told him angrily, and he caught Annatar’s hair and forced him to look up.“You _are_.You fool.How long have you lived here with me?Do you not trust me?”

“Do _I_ not trust _—”_ Annatar choked on another moan that might have been another laugh or a sob.“Oh, Tyelpe, oh, love, I—” He clenched again, spasming again, and Celebrimbor could not stop himself this time, crying out at the top of his lungs as he spilled himself inside the Maia, with an ecstacy shading into pain.

Annatar was still incoherent, still rocking his hips back against Celebrimbor desperately.“Shhh,” Celebrimbor told him again.“Don’t worry, you’ll get my— _ah_ —you’ll get my fingers, just a moment.”

“You won’t—you won’t—” Annatar clutched at his wrist.“You won’t leave me?”

“Of course I won’t leave you, you idiot.”He pulled out and pushed at Annatar’s shoulder.“Roll onto your side.”As Annatar complied, he slotted himself against the Maia’s sweat-slick, overheated back and pressed three fingers inside him, taking Annatar’s still-hard cock in his hand.

“Not much longer, I think,” Annatar mumbled faintly.“Sorry, sorry, I’m so—”

Celebrimbor held him close, feeling the tremors that still ran through him, as he urged him to thrust into his hand.“Please start wearing protective outfits in the lab,” he said into Annatar’s ear as he licked at it and sighed to himself at the warm feeling that Annatar’s startled laugh gave him.Everything had changed, and yet—as Annatar cried out and spilled over his fist again, then lay back, wearily, into his arms, he wondered—had nothing changed at all?

“Is that enough?” he asked.“Do you need more?”

Annatar’s dazed eyes regarded him.“I think—it’s enough,” he mumbled.“I didn’t—I didn’t need as much as last time, it didn’t last as long, I don’t—know why.”His eyes were full of tears.He was wrecked, ruined, stripped and laid bare.His face twisted, a little, something of the remoteness he had presented when he had first arrived in Eregion reasserting itself.“What are you going to do with me, Tyelpe?” he murmured.“I’ve showed you my hand.I’ve lost.”He sounded—almost relieved, Celebrimbor thought, and it made him wonder.

“I’m definitely going to make you start wearing protective outfits,” he said dryly.“No,” as Annatar opened his mouth again, “I know what you meant.I stand by what I said.This is Eregion, and I am its lord.I do not take what is not freely given, though I will defend myself and my city to my own death.”

Annatar shook his head.“You—you call _me_ a fool,” he whispered.“If I were using you, it would be so easy, right now, to hurt you.To kill you.To—”

“Do you really think so?”Celebrimbor knew his face probably betrayed its hurt.“I do not think I am so weak as you account me.”

“No,” Annatar said abruptly.“No—you are not.You are—I do not understand you, but you are not weak.You are brilliant and beautiful, and your mind meets mine in a way that—”He shut his eyes.“Let me swear fealty to you, lord of Eregion,” he said.“Then what you do with me is your own business.”

Celebrimbor stared at him.“What?”

“I had—I had already considered it,” Annatar mumbled, turning his face away.“Let me do it now.Please.”Tears were shining in his eyes again when he opened them.“You were not the only one who felt this connection, even without—without my—”

“Foolishness?” Celebrimbor supplied and was shocked with Annatar nodded, hesitant and small as it was.He hesitated a bare moment longer, then spoke, “Very well, Annatar, Lord of Gifts.If thou willt offer thyself, I can do nothing but accept.”

Annatar—dear Annatar—still, somehow, Annatar—nodded slowly.“Then I pledge myself to you, Tyelperinquar—Celebrimbor, Lord of Eregion.My _fana_ and my _eäla_.You are my lord and none other; all other pledges having been broken I forswear them as well.And—” he dropped exhausted back onto the pillows, “I will swear the same vows before an audience, but—but perhaps not immediately?”

“Perhaps not.”Almost timidly, Celebrimbor laced their hands together.“I believe thou need rest, and I need—time.But thou may rest assured, Annatar, that thou art under my protection.I will not hurt thee nor allow harm to come to thee.”

“Punishment?” Annatar whispered, his voice trembling badly.“Am I—to be—punished?”

“Hast thou ever seen me wield a punishment that was not for the benefit of the recipient as well as those they had injured?”

“No, Tyelpe.”

“Well, then.”He kissed Annatar’s forehead (still thrilling—perhaps there was something wrong with him, but he could not help the queer feeling that swelled in his chest all the same).He didn’t know what the future would bring; he didn’t really want to think very hard about the past—but the present, all things considered, was turning out surprisingly well.


End file.
